Our hopes rest peculiarly on that enthusiastic and exclusive devotion to the highest branch of art, which is made the subject of derision by its modern patrons. It is not surely well-timed, when the British legislature boasts of the magnificent exertions which it is about to make for the promotion of painting, to deride the artist who makes glory his chief aim; to tell him that he must depend solely upon the taste of private amateurs and collectors, and that it is foolish to think of anything but how to turn his talents to the best pecuniary account. Upon the whole, we conceive that if an attempt is to be made to form a high school of painting, Mr Haydon promises best to be its main prop; and that, therefore, the nation are, to a certain extent, throwing a pearl away, when they force him to descend into a lower branch of the art. It may be proper to repeat, that we are very far indeed from not applauding the design of forming a national gallery of the works of established masters. The benefit to be anticipated, however, consists rather in affording to the nation a refined gratification, and improving its taste, than in prompting to the production of new works, to which it may even in some respects oppose an obstacle. Its insufficiency to produce this result, is clearly proved by the inferior schools, which succeeded, both at Rome and in France, after the galleries of both had just been filled with models of the purest and highest character. Vienna and Dresden have long possessed collections superior to those which Raphael and Michael Angelo found when they began to paint; yet neither of these cities have produced even a second-rate artist. We should certainly then consider it much to be regretted, if, while the British government is preparing to spend hundreds of thousands in the promotion of art, they should overlook the only effectual means of raising it to a high character; and while they fill their galleries with the. productions of foreign and deceased artists, should leave living genius to the precarious and imperfect support of private patronage. FUGITIVE AND OCCASIONAL PIECES. ON THE DEATH OF DAVID RICARDO, Esq. "FAREWELL! a long farewell!" Amidst mankind, How few could rival thee-how few could claim Or syren Pleasure's soft seductive smiles ?- But call'd to higher objects, such as raise E'en those who thought thee wrong, will now attest Profound in science (Oh! could all we read Thy weeping kindred round thy tomb shall kneel, T A MONODY ON THE DEATH OF R. BLOOMFIELD, THE SUFFOLK BARD. BY W. FLETCHER. SICILIAN maids, I woo ye once again, And call ye from your rocks and heathy hills, I call ye from your desert shores, I call ye forth, and bid ye hither bring Flowers, simple flowers, from blooming hedge-rows wild, For he was nature's own and simplest child; The humble daisy and the violet's bloom Shall droop and wither o'er the poet's tomb; With every bud and flow'ret of the vale, That smiles o'er Nature's face, and scents the gale. With ardent thirst the muse's victim drew Oh shame! inglorious age, to think the muse Ye part the poet from the man, and deem Then strew, ob, strew his grave, ye maids of song, Hither let Innocence her footsteps bend, To point him triumphing in happier skies. For here he rests, within his silent grave, Who sought, but found no human hand to save, The rosy links which bound him to the world But shew'd him sorrows for the future day. Then strew, oh strew this hallow'd spot around, A PRAYER, BY WILLIAM BECKFORD, ESQ.* LIKE the low murmur of the secret stream In the recesses of the forest vale, On the wild mountain,-on the verdant sod, When the faint sickness of a wounded heart Creeps in cold shudderings through my sinking frame, I turn to thee that holy peace impart Which soothes the invokers of thy awful name. O all-pervading Spirit!-sacred beam! Parent of life and light!-Eternal Power! Grant me through obvious clouds one transient gleam * From Mr Britton's Illustrations of Fonthill. |